


Birds of a Feather

by 221b_hound



Series: Guitar Man [54]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Epic Friendships, Gen, if things were different
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-30
Updated: 2013-06-30
Packaged: 2017-12-16 15:50:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/863801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221b_hound/pseuds/221b_hound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Mary are in love. Their best friends, Sherlock and Nirupa, are... in like.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Birds of a Feather

**Author's Note:**

> The title comes from the song by The Civil Wars.
> 
> The song is Swift, which John wrote for Mary's birthday and can be found here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/861164.
> 
> I have finally been able to upload the vocal for this at sendspace: [Swift](http://www.sendspace.com/file/3s1p6c)
> 
> My thanks to the lovely Dee, who advised me on British birds and suggested the Carrion Crow.

Sherlock braced himself against the weight of the figure slumped along his back while he slotted the key into the door of 221 Baker Street. The door swung open and he paused to wriggle his shoulders, trying to rouse the woozy burden against his spine.

"Nirupa. Wake up."

"'M no' 'sleep," came the slurred reply.

"Evidence would appear to contradict you," said Sherlock, but without any real bite. "Come on. Stand up."

With a delicate little grunt of effort, Nirupa pushed herself upright and allowed Sherlock to take her by the elbow. He led her through the foyer and up the stairs to the flat. He sensed Nirupa grab a handful of the back of his coat and he heard as she began to sing.

_You are a swift and_

_You cannot be tamed_

_Living life upon the wing_

_Your joy cannot be contained_

 

He maneouvred her through the door and towards the sofa as she got to the next line.

_Your wingspan fills the sky,_

_Your call is a freedom cry_

_and it's because I know you're coming back_

_That I can say goodbye_

 

Nirupa wobbled in front of the sofa, somehow refusing to bend her unsteady knees. Instead, she took hold of the lapel of Sherlock's coat.

"It's a beautiful song," she said, more awake but still slurring.

"It is," Sherlock agreed, trying to gently prise her fingers off the Belstaff.

"He understands her."

"Yes, he does."

"He really does. He understands my Mary. And he wrote a wonderful song for her birthday. She liked it. She liked the song."

Sherlock's attempts to detach Nirupa became slightly more insistent, but she hung grimly on.

"You don't mind, do you?"

Sherlock sighed and dropped his hands. Try as he might, he simply could not narrow down which of four issues Nirupa referenced.

"Mind what?"

"Me staying here tonight? John and Mary are celebrating Mary's birthday at our place and they get so LOUD."

"I am aware."

"You don't mind how much he loves her?"

He arched an eyebrow. "Why would I mind that?"

Nirupa sighed then, and nodded as though something made sense at last. "I don't either," she said, "Not really. I loved her once, that way, but I love her like something else now. Took a few years, but I don't wish she was mine, any more. I love her now more than I used to want her."

Sherlock closed his eyes. "In the morning, when you ask if I remember this conversation, I'm going to tell you 'no'."

Nirupa nodded some more. "You are a good man, Sherlock Holmes."

"I find that hard to believe," he said, tone half resigned and half amused, "I'm simply not anything like as drunk as you are."

That comment brought a huge smile to Nirupa's face. "It was a great party. Don't you think it was a great party?"

"I hate parties."

Nirupa slapped her hand against his chest in sloppy admonishment and then laughed. "I saw you singing. And you danced with me. You had fun. I can tell."

"Are you going to let go of me so I can fetch a blanket. I am fairly certain that John would expect me to furnish you with bedding. Or you could just bury yourself in cushions."

"CUSHION FORT!" shouted Nirupa with sudden enthusiasm, then she giggled and, still holding onto Sherlock's lapel, her knees finally gave way and she folded onto the sofa. Sherlock perforce had to follow her down or let his neck be wrenched. He ended up bent over her, and she looked up at him, nose to elegant nose.

"I like you, Sherlock," she said with breezy affection, "So smart. So, so smart. High IQs are sexy, did you know?"

"I've been informed."

"And you're pretty, for a man."

There was a beat before he said: "Thank you. You are not unattractive yourself."

"Flatterer."

"I never flatter."

"No," she agreed, "You really don't. That's another thing I like about you. Honest. Straight talking. That's good. Straightforward is good. And you're funny." Her grin became blinding and, to Sherlock's astonishment, she rubbed her nose against his in a gesture of blissful, innocent affection. "If I were straight, or if you were a woman, I would totally make a pass at you."

And then she planted a chaste little kiss on his cheek and finally let him go. She sank back onto the sofa with a happy sigh and tilted sideways.

"And if you were straight or I was a woman, and I was the slightest bit interested in romantic relationships," said Sherlock softly as he lifted her feet onto the sofa, pulled off her shoes and tucked a cushion under her head, "I would let you."

He shook out the blanket that lay folded along the back of the sofa and settled it over Nirupa's now sleeping form. Remembering some unfortunate incidents from when John had overindulged at the pub in times past, Sherlock found a bucket to put on the floor by her head. Then he patted her shoulder and made his way, wiht only the slightest inebriated wobble, to his own room.

**

 

Nirupa woke up in a cocoon consisting of woollen blanket, too many cushions, a blinding headache and nausea.

_**CLUNK!** _

Oh god, and also the most awful hypersensitivity to noise. She cracked open one bleary eye and slammed it shut again. The most godawful photosensitivity, too.

God. Damn. It. She'd got drunk again. After promising herself never to do that again. Not after that whole thing with the fermented root vegetable brew in Brazil, followed by the boar hunt and the white water rafting which ended up with that whole snake incident.

She groaned and burrowed into the sensation of blanket and cushions. After a few moments, a thought surfaced, and she wondered what had caused that violent clunk! so close to her ear.

Opening her eyes in a cautious, narrow slit, she found herself staring at an out-of-focus map of London with steam curling out the top of it.

_What?_

 

A few seconds more and her vision belatedly came into focus. Ah. A porcelain mug - one of the set she and Mary had bought for the boys for Christmas, each cup bearing a map of a different section of the London ABC - filled with (she sniffed carefully) jasmine tea. Her preferred tipple, when she wasn't poisoning herself with champagne.

She struggled to sit up, drew the blanket around herself and clutched the cup like it was a life-giving serum. In moments, she was feeling very nearly alive again.

Hearing a faint sound, Nirupa made the exhausting effort to focus beyond the rim of the cup.

There was Sherlock, at his kitchen table, bent over something she couldn't see. From his posture and the movement of his shoulders and arms, he was performing some detailed, fine-work task. Perfectly concentrated, and perfectly sober, the bastard.

"Don't blame me if you feel unwell," he said, not even turning to look at her.

Nirupa sighed. She tried to decide if she was annoyed at his attitude or just impressed, as usual, at his ability to reason her likely thought process by hearing alone.

"Exactly how awful was I last night?" she decided to ask instead.

"You told everyone at the party that you were an actual queen and had the tribal scar to prove it. You also told them that Mary aged like a great cheese, and that if she was a swift, you yourself were a heron, John was a kestrel and that I was a carrion crow."

Nirupa mumbled something obscene and buried her face in one hand, pressing the mug of tea to her cheek.

"I wouldn't worry about it," continued Sherlock, "It's true that the ceremony that gave you the scar made you a form of royalty - of course I looked it up - and Mary laughed so hard at being called a fine aged cheese she insisted on being called Mary of Red Leicester for the next half hour. And the bird analogies are remarkably apt."

Nirupa groaned again and opened one eye. "Sorry about the crow."

"Carrion crows are dark-feathered intelligent loners that loiter around dead things. I would say the analogy holds."

Nirupa pressed the cup to her forehead this time, then took a sip and relaxed. "I like carrion crows," she said, "Useful birds in the ecology, and they're not always loners. They're very sociable at times, I've noticed."

A huff of expelled air made her look up, and then she realised Sherlock had laughed. She smiled wryly.

"Thanks for the tea."

"You're welcome."

"And the sofa."

"Do you have to keep talking? I'm busy."

Nirupa closed her eyes, wrapped her hands around the cup and leaned back into the sofa, letting it and the cushions hold her up. 

She was feeling better already, less nauseated, though still headachy. She could hear Sherlock returning to his whatever-it-was at the table.

A few minutes passed in companionable silence. Nirupa finished her tea and sat, hands still clasped around the cooling cup, regarding Sherlock as he worked.

"I meant it you know. What I said last night. If the world was different. If I was different." She paused. "If you were different too."

"That is a lot of 'if'." he said, not turning.

Nirupa tapped her nail against the rim of the cup. Sighed. Rose and let the blanket fall from her shoulders.

"I'm for a shower."

She put the cup on the coffee table and walked past Sherlock on the way to the bathroom. As she passed, his hand shot out, taking her firmly by the wrist.

"I meant it too," he said, glancing up at her. "There is a lot of 'if', but yes.  If." He let her wrist go. "Now go away. I'm busy. These cultures won't test themselves."

Nirupa, grinning again, went away to shower.

**

 

Much later in the day, they met with Mary and John for lunch at a cafe near the Serpentine. A heron landed on the riverbank, and when Sherlock looked pointedly from the bird to Nirupa, Nirupa laughed. 

"It is a good resemblance," remarked Mary, then giggled. John laughed and kissed her temple, murmuring something about 'my bird'. She laughed out loud then and gave him a pecking-motion kiss on the nose.

"If you're a carrion crow," said Nirupa, ignoring the wanton display of affection, "I suppose that makes your brother a Tower of London raven."

"If you continue with this series of analogies," said Sherlock, "We can no longer be friends."

"Grumpy old crow."

"Scrawny heron."

They waited for input from the happy couple, but the happy couple were busy snogging.

Nirupa and Sherlock's eyes met. They exchanged identical eye-rolls and settled back to their favourite shared pasttime of deducing the lives of the people passing by and watching their closest friends be obnoxiously happy together.

 

 

 


End file.
